


Begin Again

by giraffles



Series: FMA Rarepair Week 2016 [3]
Category: Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types, Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Crossover, DON'T U JUDGE ME, FMA Rarepair Week, Fluff and Angst, I REGRET NOTHING, I can write aus of aus if I want to, I wanted to try polydins in this au and this is what happened, Multi, Past Abuse, both the galra and coran need to stop cockblocking, cuddle piles, oh well YOLO, polyships count as rarepairs right
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-07
Updated: 2016-09-07
Packaged: 2018-08-13 11:03:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,127
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7974490
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/giraffles/pseuds/giraffles
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>You be the moon and I’ll be the earth, and when we burst, start over</i>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Some day, Rosa Maria, you will start a revolution.”</p>
<p>And so she did.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Begin Again

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Spectrum](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7863271) by [giraffles](https://archiveofourown.org/users/giraffles/pseuds/giraffles). 



> So this a Voltron: Legendary Defender crossover, loosely connected to the crossover fic Spectrum I started. (and will be continuing once rarepair week is over) I’m all about that polyship life but I haven’t decided if this ship will become ‘fic canon’ so to speak. 
> 
> If you would like some more background info, please check out the Spectrum tag on my tumblr! (cariisms)

Rose Thomas never set out to save the universe.

Hell, she never set out to join the Garrison either, and look how well that had worked out for her. Not that she wasn’t glad for the twist— how else would she have met sulking Edward with his biting wit, sweet Alphonse and his endless patience? Or Winy with her boundless enthusiasm, Sheska and her bookish ways, spawning outlandish theories that turned out to be painfully true. Or even the Tringhams, who before this whole incident she had only met in passing, but couldn’t imagine a team without them.

_A team._ Wasn’t that just a novel concept. They’re getting better, day by day, little by little. Continuous maneuvers and drills and bonding exercises had cobbled them into something resembling the paladins of old. But it’s a trickle, a desperate bailing action on a sinking ship. In some ways they’ve made remarkable progress; in others, they’re still just a bunch of kids, in way over their heads.

She never intended to be a leader. She’s taken to the role, made it work, and out of all of them she’s the best suited. It’s still a strange thing to wrap her head around sometimes. The limelight is not a place she has ever felt comfortable in, because drawing attention to oneself has never ended well for her. Her lion will rumble at her anyway, reassuring her that if she wasn’t up to the task, then the sentient war ship could have chosen another.

Rose will always have her doubts. It’s a symptom of the systematic abuse at the hands of the cult she grew up in. None of it was her fault, because no one chooses who they’re born to, but knowing that doesn’t undo the damage done. She’s worked hard to get to where she is now. But it’s still a lot to wrestle with, on top of trying to liberate an entire universe.

So it’s very, very strange when she falls into something _more_ than just teammates and comrades at arms.

She supposes it started long before she actually noticed, because she was too preoccupied with trying to live up to a legend. Not that anyone could have blamed her. Edward gave her his knife, the dagger he always kept on his person ‘just in case’, because the lack of a bayard left her without her own weapon. He had insisted even though she knew how much it meant to him, and the blade had come in handy more times that she would like to admit. It stays on her hip now, both in uniform and out.

There’s a bracelet that graces her left wrist nowadays, braided with alien threads and pale pink crystals that put Earth minerals to shame. Russell had pressed it into her hands when they had visited an intergalactic bazaar of sorts, too excited about how it matched her name and her hair for Rose to say no. Because there’s a difference in the way he smiles for her, just for her, rather than anyone else. If it was any one else making the connection between her given name and shades of red maybe she would have been annoyed. But there’s something different about the way he does it.

It’s like Cain all over again. Cain who told her she was beautiful, that she should embrace everything she was denied growing up. Cain who helped her dye her hair pastel in the front, who gave her the confidence to say yes, it _is_ because her name is Rose, own that name and forge your own legacy. Things always seemed so easy to do when he was around. Reaching for the stars and dragging them down to earth was as natural as breathing for him.

He died two years ago. On a mission to the edge of the solar system. Pilot error, they said, even though she knew it was utter bullshit. Even though everyone knew it was bullshit. Now she knows it was a Galra scout. Knowing doesn’t make it any easier to bear. But maybe, just maybe, there can be a little closure in that. She’s no longer hoping to find him among the constellations, waiting to come home. To come back to her.

She has to move on. She has a team, a family, to protect. She has a castle-ship full of feelings that she has to work out before it got in the way of their mission statement. It hasn’t affected anything yet, and that’s the imperative term. _Yet._

 

* * *

 

Rose kisses Russell first. It’s not as though she planned which one of them to confront before the other. (Really, she had wanted to sit them _both_ down and talk these things out.) It just… happened. In the lounge late at night and into the early morning, pouring over data pads and reminiscing about home. Home was so far away, and probably would be for a very long time. The only pieces of Earth culture and familiarity they have are each other and what few belongings they had carried with them. She did a flawless impression of Professor Grumman that had both of them in hysterics, and honestly she was just trying to shush him before he woke up the whole ship.

But it was so easy to fall onto him, and he let her lead— something she didn’t get all that often, because others wanted her to be chaste and demure and _passive_ — but his hands in her hair and around her waist felt so right. There was the possibility she was just lonely, some sort of desperate, yet it’s more than that. It’s more than just teeth and tongue and fumbling when Coran comes bursting in, oblivious to them and the way they spring apart at a moments notice. Coran ropes Russell into some sort of cleaning duty even as he complains loudly, and she made her escape, suddenly too self conscious to stay.

She’s twenty-three, for god’s sake, she shouldn’t feel like a teenager skulking around for tickets to third base.

All caution and pretense of staying a stoic leader flies out an airlock when they barely make it through their next battle. As usual, they barely win, barely scraping by with far too many close calls. But today Edward, ridiculous, rash, stubborn Edward, decided to nearly get himself killed in the process. By the time the Red Lion has limped back to the castle-ship, she’s already thrown herself from Black’s cockpit and rushed to the adjoining hanger to meet him. She’s livid at the risks he’s taken. She can’t believe she was so close to losing someone _again_.

He’s fine. More or less, a little battered up from their recent skirmish but still in one aggravating piece. She’s so relieved she could cry. Upon seeing his roguish grin and hearing his statement of how ‘awesome that last move was’, she punches him in the shoulder. Hard. He stumbles back with a squawk, looks for sympathy from his family and teammates, and finds none. She’s not sure when the rapid fire conversation about battle tactics (and what constituted necessary risks or not) changed to aggressive kissing, but she can’t find it in herself to disengage. Not even with the chorus of ‘ohhh’s and an obnoxious wolf whistle behind them. She’s at least 80% sure the whistle is Russell.

Their Altean hosts think it’s some sort of post-battle ritual. Ed says they should make it one anyway.

 

* * *

 

Maybe part of the reason Rose hates how headstrong her two paladins can be is because she sees herself in them. Like them, she would die for this team. This cause. For _them_. Because maybe it’s unhealthy, but they’re all she has left now. She misses Earth but she knows it’s not a home, not without them.

So this is how she falls into Galra hands, putting herself in between the enemy and the people she loves. They’ll hate her for her sacrifice. But they’ll live to fight another day. They’ll find another to pilot her lion. She can still feel Black, ever so faintly, so far away that the threads of their connection are fraying. There is no judgment there. The centuries old ship understands why she had to do it.

The Druids are the worst part of it. They have had decades to perfect torture, to learn how to unravel minds and pry fears deep out of psyches. They weave vivid illusions that only add to her undoing. She can’t tell if they’re after information or just think it’s fun to toy with her. She supposes it doesn’t matter much.

They find the worst of her, every piece she had carefully locked away in order to function on a day-to-day basis. The Church of the Sun God was not kind to her, but she had purposely forgotten just how bad it was.

_‘They were right.’_ Come the insidious whispers, curling around her consciousness, _‘Weak. Lacking. A failure.’_

Yes. How many people has she let down now? So many. The Druids wear the skins of the priests, of the other members, looking down at her with disappointment. Disgust. She feels violet claws digging into her cheek, forcing her to look. It’s her mother now. Telling her how she was a mistake.

Wait.

That can’t be right. No, her mother would never. She was warmth, sunshine and lavender soap. Strong arms that encircled her and kept her safe. Determination, tinged with regret, but never for her birth. She was only a tiny child, bouncing on her mother’s knee, when she had said;

_‘Some day, Rosa Maria, you will start a revolution.’_

Rose hadn’t understood when she meant then. It was a strange word that she didn’t understand, and one she wouldn’t find the meaning to until years after her death. Her mother had been lured into the cult, when she was low and pregnant and desperate, and by the time Rose realized how dark the halls of the sun god were it was too late for her.

_‘Some day, you’ll be free.’_

A complicated concept, to be sure. What did it mean to be free? To make her own way in the world? Choose her own family? To be weak if she wanted to be? Princess Allura talked about fate and destiny an awful lot, and she was uncomfortable with the subjects, because it implied that she had no control over anything. Was that what she really wanted, then? Was control to be free?

_‘I want you to see the world for me.’_

Oh, mother, she has seen the world. And so much more. She’s seen stars live and die. Watched worlds crumble and lives be destroyed. Space is cold. Unforgiving. The universe is a harsh place, made harsher by Galra rule. But there’s beauty here too. Oh, mother, there are mineral springs on moons that shine with all the colors of the rainbow. There are soft alien races that share food and song and joy without want for anything in return. There’s the weight of a knife strapped to her thigh and the sensation of cold beads digging into her wrist. There is love out here. And that counts for something.

_‘Some day, Rosa Maria, you will start a revolution.’_

And so she did.

 

* * *

 

Of course the Druids don’t like when she fights back. They find new ways to cloud her mind, new ways to destroy her sense of reality. They wrap a hand around her throat and plunge her into a dark realm of illusion while trying to choke the life from her. The Galra holding her fast attempts to take on a familiar form to throw her off. Weaken her resolve. But they can’t seem to decide which shade of blonde they want, either summer sun or cast in moonlight. Amber or steel. Red or blue. Somewhere in the distance, she can almost hear their voices, yelling for death and vengeance.

Except then the illusion is suddenly broken and she’s left gasping on the ground. Head spinning, she can’t quite process what’s happening. But there’s a lot of screaming, an improvised war cry, and bolts of energy flying in from outside her field of vision. Rose doesn’t dare believe it’s true.

Not until the hum of Ed’s bayard comes whirling in, blade reaching for the Druid and missing, does it really sink in. It buys enough time for him to throw her over his shoulder and run yelling from the room. Even in her dazed state she realizes that Russell is covering for them with his crossbow. She wants to call out a warning, because they’re dangerous, _so dangerous_ , but then alarms are blaring and she knows they didn’t come alone. Their helter-skelter attack has thrown the Galra off guard and allows them to escape with Rose in tow. She always forgets that for as small as Ed is, he’s a lot stronger than he seems.

      “I,” she gasps above the waling alarms, “I can walk.”

      “Nope, running! Definitely running!” A stray shot from a sentry passes too close to comfort, and Ed snarls behind him, “ _Cover me_ , jackass!”

      “I _am!_ ” Russell almost whines, “It’s not my fault there are so many of them!”

It’s just too much. She wills her shoulders not to shake, because she’s torn between laughing and weeping at her situation. Nothing ever goes as planned.

They all make it off the ship alive.

 

* * *

 

She expects them all to be angry with her, to shun her for being both selfless and selfish and prompting a rescue mission that put them all at risk. They don’t. They’re just glad to have her back, to have her safe and whole. There is so much honest affection that she feels as though her heart may burst. She’s pretty sure Coran cries. (Fletcher definitely does, because he’s always been a crier, and there’s no stopping once it’s started.) And for a while every thing is right in the universe.

She was a fool to think she could get off that easily.

Rose has never slept well, not since the desperate night she stole away from the convent and ran to the civilized world. Insomnia can plague them all, considering the high stress environment they’ve all been thrust into, but now it’s worse. So much worse. Every time she’s just drifted off the nightmares come rushing in. Cold claws and dark magic and everyone she’s ever cared about in broken masses at her feet. She wakes in a cold sweat nearly every night. She even tries sleeping in her lion, and Black does her best to sooth her, but it’s not enough.

Weeks later she gives up. Rose goes looking for a bit of human contact, hoping at least for someone to talk to. Someone who might understand what it’s like to be torn apart and stitched back together. So she goes looking for Edward.

She knows exactly where each of their rooms are, having memorized the castle layout early on. She hesitates at the plain door, which has a terrible drawing of a dragon and flames taped to it. It’s funnier because she knows he didn’t draw it. It takes her far too long to convince herself to knock. There’s no answer, just her knuckles wringing on the metal. On a whim she touches the hand pad to open it— it’s not locked, and slides away without a second thought. The room is empty. And far too neatly kept. This all tells her that not only is Ed not around, he hasn’t been using his assigned room lately. The answer comes to her, and it’s so _obvious_ that she feels rather stupid as she turns down the corridor and makes a right.

This door is actually unmarked, but of course she knows who’s it is. Something possesses her to try the pad first before knocking, and it too is unlocked. The corridor light floods the room and illuminates two covered lumps on the bed. Suddenly she feels intrusive, any confidence she had eking away at the sight, because who is she fooling. She doesn’t belong. A head pops up before she can turn and flee.

      “I’m sorry,” Is the only intelligent thing she can whisper, the breaking of the silence like glass upon her tongue, “I didn’t mean to wake you.”

      “ ‘S fine.” Russell is barely conscious and peering at her blearily, hair askew and with what looks to be a drool mark from his bedmate on his shirt. “You okay?”

Even as he says it, they both know what the answer is. She’s very not okay. She hasn’t been okay for a long time. But she manages, with a little help from all of them. Russell reaches down and starts to roll the mass under the blankets, which she assumes was at one point Edward, over to one side. There’s a lot of sleepy huffing from beneath the fabric. “C’mon. You should stay.”

She almost protests, but he’s already made room between them and is waiting expectantly. And in that regard she _is_ weak. Because this is what she’s wanted from the beginning, so how can she turn it down when it’s so close she can touch it? And she’s so very, very tired of never having a chance at peace. So she doesn’t say anything and lets the door close behind her. She climbs over him to the middle of the too small bed, navigating too many pairs of limbs and blankets that have become a hopeless tangle. They really shouldn’t fit at all, but somehow it works. Even back on Earth, for all the progress that’s been made, their relationship, or whatever it is they have, would still turn heads. Still invite rumor and scandal and drama.

As though any of those things would undo her grip on them. On both of them. Maybe it’s greedy. Maybe it’s a little unorthodox. But it works, and god, isn’t she allowed to be happy for just this once?  And she’s sure that come morning she’ll face the dread of embarking into the unknown, deal with the fear that this dynamic will upset their team dynamic, and render them all useless to do the one job they have. Defend the universe. _Protect_ the universe. Liberate countless peoples from the empire that has done nothing but drag them all down. But that’s for tomorrow.  

For now she’s taking this moment for herself. And maybe not just for herself, but also for the ones wrapped up in this with her, with one burrowing into her side and the other latching onto her arm. And they’ll surely argue and do stupid things and make her sick with a hundred conflicting emotions— and she wouldn’t trade it for all the stars in their galaxy.


End file.
